More materials by author

So what is the burn and dodge tool good for anyways? Well, if you ever need to lighten or darken something to add depth, darken colors, or add some other sort of attribute to an image or design, the burn and dodge tools can very well be your best friends.

Editor's Pick in Photoshop Tutorials, April 20063D logos are a must for any web site that wants to have the extra edge. This tutorial will take you step by step through everything you need to know to make 3D logos.

Editor's Pick in Photoshop Tutorials, April 2006Learning the techniques of abstract brushing might be the very thing you need to really vamp up your site. This tutorial will help you get the results you are looking for.

1. Open a picture of clouds:
2. Notice it seems really dull. I took this picture on a very sunny day, and it still turned out looking like it is about to storm! To fix it, we will use our level adjuster (Image > Adjustments > Levels):

1. Create a new document. Fill it with a black to transparent gradient like this. To do this first select your gradient tool:
2. Now in your colors, set your foreground color to black:
3. Now, in your gradient options, select the gradient that looks like this:

1. Create a new document. I will be creating mine at 300x300, but yours may be whatever size you choose. Fill your document with a dark background color: 2. Create a rectangle selection like this, make a new layer, and fill it with a lighter shade of your background color:

1.Without materials, we see the default grey material on our objects we make:
2. This looks pretty lame, right? Well, using materials, we can greatly improve the quality of our renders! In this tutorial, you will learn how to make the glossy materials that I use in some of my renders.